


It Comes in Threes

by TardisInWonderland



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-11
Updated: 2013-03-12
Packaged: 2017-12-05 00:45:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/716922
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TardisInWonderland/pseuds/TardisInWonderland
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They say that death comes in threes... perhaps love does, too?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The First

The first time he fell in love, it was overwhelming.

A dark-haired, blue-eyed beauty struck him as no other woman ever had. She was smart and skilled, gentle with most but stern with anyone who happened to cross her, and well-liked around their small village. They were young, barely out of their teens, when he first caught sight of her. She was pretty, especially when she smiled, but he hadn’t realized how her smile made his heart flutter until years after that day.

When he first started courting her, she’d been bemused, but slowly warmed to his kind manner. He was so soft-spoken back then, so open and vulnerable as he had never been before. Eventually, the light in her eyes changed to a soft, warm glow that spoke of tenderness and affection. He thought at the time that it would never be possible to love anyone else in the same way, and he told her so one day. She blushed and returned his sentiment shyly.

He married her, and she gave him a son, a beautiful baby boy that he would have sacrificed the world for- still would, to this very day. She returned his embraces with affection, but not with passion, not with the type of amorous fervor expected of a new husband and wife. Not with the same emotion as a woman in love.

That should have been his first hint, but he was so blinded by his affections that he didn’t even notice things falling apart around their tiny family.

After his return from the wars, thing had become strained between them. He returned to spinning, thankful that his trade could be accomplished with a lame foot, and she took care of their child. As the boy grew older and his wife was able to have more time outside the house, things collapsed even more.

He would return home from a trip to the market to find their son left alone, sometimes asleep, and sometimes awake sitting by the fire. The boy was seven years old. All alone in the darkness. The first time it happened, they fought. It was dangerous and inconsiderate to leave their boy alone, he said. Irresponsible and stupid. She had screamed back that he was never home, never there to take care of their child, and what was so wrong with taking a night for herself?

What was _wrong_?

He was in love, not stupid. And much to his dismay a little of his love for her still remained even now, when he knew what she was doing out alone. They hadn’t lain together since his return from the wars- she found discreet ways to make it very clear that she did not want to be touched by her lame and cowardly husband. He was only surprised that it hadn’t happened sooner… or perhaps it had. The last straw, though, was leaving their son alone to go off sleeping with half the town.

What happened to her? What happened to the wonderful, kind person that he used to know? Was the shock of his desertion so great that it drove her to hate him? Hadn’t she once cared for him as intensely as he had cared for her? Little love remained for her, but a sense of loyalty and duty still remained, so when she was taken by the pirate (so he thought), he went after her, but failed. What could a poor, lame spinner do against a strong pirate who happened to be deadly with a cutlass?

She went with the pirates.

For many years, he thought she was dead. The next time he saw her was the day that he realized her treachery, felt the sting of her words, and ripped her heart from her chest. In a way, he would never forgive himself for it.

They were different people now, no longer the poor spinner and his equally poor but happy wife. They were the Dark One and the Pirate’s Lady, and they owed each other nothing. The past was the past, she said, but he knew that it might only ever be paid for by blood. The dark magic of the dagger, the magic that he’d taken to save his son, had twisted his very soul into something black, ugly, and never to be redeemed. All the love he had ever borne for his wife now belonged to his son, the boy that had been his everything until… until he lost him.

Perhaps that was the day that he truly realized everything he’d become, and _embraced_ it. The choice was there- he could have shunned the magic forever, but he knew that without it he might never get his boy back, might never be able to ask for forgiveness, tell him that he loved him. Without his magic he risked having the same damaged relationship with the boy as his own father cultivated with him. Without his magic, he would lose the child as he lost the boy’s mother.

On the day he found his wife once more, he held her heart in his hand, and he crushed it before the eyes of her True Love, because he was no longer a man, but a monster.

In a way, it was true that he would never quite love anyone else like he’d loved her (and never for a moment could he deny that he’d loved her). First loves, and first not-quite-loves, are little things to be cherished and treasured as life goes on. They open your mind and your senses to new emotions and relationships, and they teach you to open your heart… or to guard it. After he lost his wife, and later his son, his heart became so full of darkness that he didn’t ever think it would be possible to return back to what he was before. Any and all innocence and joy from that first love had washed away and left nothing but darkness and pain in its wake.


	2. The Second

The second time he fell in love, it was passionate.

Another dark-haired, blue-eyed beauty hit him like a shock, like a bolt of lightning, like a clap of thunder or a blow to the chest. Trapped in a tower, his foresight had led him to her, but he hadn’t expected the woman waiting for him.

Her child was important, he knew. He needed the child, but he was unexpectedly intrigued by the woman. She wanted power and the chance to make more of herself- he could practically feel the fire burning behind her eyes, yearning to be something more than a miller’s daughter.

Teach me. Don’t just do it. Teach me.

She wasn’t afraid of him, perhaps because she’d never heard of him or of the true extent of his powers, or perhaps because she was as intrigued by him as he was by her. She had been beaten down, forced to kneel as he had been, made to feel like nothing in front of the power of the land, and she wouldn’t stand for it. Don’t stop until they’re on their knees, he told her. That’s how you do it. That’s how you become powerful.

She took to magic like a moth to the flame. Of course, not just anyone could work magic, but someone due to have a daughter as powerful as hers would be would certainly have an aptitude for it. She channeled her hatred, her rage, everything that made her feel mistreated and small, into spinning the straw into gold, and something about seeing her at that particular hobby of his made him a little heady.

He sat behind her on the spinning wheel, pressing his lips to her neck over and over, and she didn’t fight his touch. She didn’t even bear it as Milah had, oh no. She _shivered_. She _welcomed_ it. The touch of a kindred spirit is sometimes more than one could ever hope for, and it grows into many things.

The darkness in them pulled the pair together like magnets, and even as her wedding to the ignorant prince of that land grew closer, their touches grew longer and their kisses grew sweeter. She never pushed him away, never let on once that she might ever be without him. On the contrary, she drew him in, ran her hands up and down his chest, tangled her fingers in his hair, and wouldn’t stop until they were both breathless and forced to pause for air.

He altered their contract, changed it so that it specified that she would give him _his_ child.

She’d agreed without batting an eyelash.

He told her he loved her without even thinking, and she had kissed him senseless.

The contract _was_ binding, of course. He taught her how best to use her magic, the dark magic that was suited to her. She could have used other types of magic, of course, but it wouldn’t have fed off of the rage and pain that she felt like the dark magic would. It wouldn’t be nearly as useful in the long run, and he could better teach her with the caliber of magic that he knew best.

He’d planned to run away with her, take their child and go off to the Dark Castle, living as happy a life as he could manage while still looking for his boy, the son that he’d lost so long ago. She’d thwarted his plans.

She was meant to rip out the heart of the king, to use it to her advantage, but she did not. Rather than the king’s heart, she ripped out her _own_ heart, thus eliminating any love she might ever have felt for him. She took the knowledge and power that he gave her and ran away, off to her palace and her prince and away from the dark monster that saved her life in the tower that night with a bit of magic and a little straw.

He wouldn’t even have the child, either. The little minx pointed out that he changed the contract- he could only have his own child, and now he never would.

She taught him that love is weakness. Love is vulnerability and can never afford you anything more than heartache and wounds that will never heal, no matter how many years pass or how many reparations are made.

No matter how much blood is spilled.

Many years later, on different soil in another world, he saw her one last time, only once. He never forgave her for leaving him- for using him to gain power and magic and then throwing him aside in favor of what she thought would have the greater reward.

Before her death, and in fact, before she nearly drove a dagger into his heart, he had asked her the question he’d wondered for so many years.

Had she ever loved him at all?

She responded with another question: _Why do you think I had to rip my own heart out_? The only man that she had ever loved would have taken her away from the power that she had struggled so far and long for. Don’t stop until they’re on their knees- wise advice, but not of he wanted to keep her by his side.

Little did she know the power they could have possessed together, but it didn’t matter now. He realized how different they were, in the moments before she died. Every single action of hers was based on acquiring power, for herself and herself alone, to rise above the station that she’d been unfairly granted by the great sorter called life. His struggle for power manifested from his son, trying to protect him and get him back.

However, they were still the same in one way: Their power had slowly consumed them.


	3. The Third

The third time he fell in love, it was slow.

The last of the beauties with dark hair and blue eyes didn’t come on him in any way he expected. Her people were dying, killed off by ogres in bloody massacres across the countryside. They called the Dark One for help, and she was waiting with them.

A woman in the war room. The _only_ woman in the room. Strange.

In hindsight, he couldn’t quite understand why he picked her as his price for working his magic on the town. Perhaps it was the way she refused to cower away from him as the rest of the room did (or to stupidly challenge him, as the knight had done when he drew his sword). Perhaps it was the fire in her eyes, or the way she held her head high even as she walked away with the monster. She shook under his touch on the way out her home, but she stood up straight and refused to cast her eyes down, hiding everything from him that she could.

It was one thing to fear, as his first love had upon seeing his newfound magic. It was one thing not to fear, as his second had. It was another thing entirely to push through your fear into something not quite stupidity or pride, and not quite stubbornness, but more than only bravery.

He hadn’t expected her to act the way she did. In all honestly, he’d expected quite a lot more sniveling and quite a lot less reading. Many times he would catch her in the library, immersing herself in one of the hundreds- nay, _thousands_ \- of books that he kept in the castle with a secretive little smile on her face.

He couldn’t find it in his heart to disturb her.

She loved the sunlight, and loved the flowers in the garden. She would make casual remarks about the dust or the dark, and took his quips with as much grace as could be expected from someone who wasn’t used to them. With as much grace as could be expected from anyone, really. Even those who knew of his teasing habits didn’t tend to take them well.

She chipped a cup one day because of his teasing, that stupid little teacup that would haunt him for the rest of his life. He shocked her with something he’ said in jest- oh, he didn’t remember what it was now, but she dropped it and it cracked against the table leg. He didn’t mind, really. He had all the gold in the world. What was one cup? She simply seemed to be relieved that he wasn’t angry.

After that, their relationship became less tense. Oh, he never expected to feel anything but casual indifference towards her, and he certainly never expected her to feel anything at all for him (except perhaps, contempt). She talked to him, though. She wanted to learn about him and his past.

 _If I’m never going to know anyone else again, can’t I at least know you_?

He almost gave in. It would be so easy to tell her everything, to crumble under her kind, forgiving gaze and tell every story he had, but he didn’t. There were plenty of ways she could use that information against him if she ever escaped (not likely, but precautions were often necessary in these cases), and he wasn’t about to let another person take from him and throw him aside.

The longer he was around her, the more she amazed him. It was more than darkness and darkness, or innocence and innocence.  She was intriguing. She was different.

And most of all, she didn’t mind that he was her polar opposite in every way.

He was darkness incarnate, and she was the light and the sun, as beautiful as the rose that he’d turned that idiot of a knight into when he tried to “rescue” her. Would she have gone with him, he wondered? If he gave her the choice, would she go?

She wanted to see the world. That was her dream, to go out and travel, and as long as their contract lasted she was stuck here in the castle with a monster. Something in him stirred at that thought, something foreign and long dead, and he had the overwhelming urge to let her go. He enjoyed her company, wanted her there with him more than anything, but there came a day when he could no longer stand the longing way she gazed out the window, watching the travelers that appeared as tiny specks on the far away mountain road.

_Go to town and fetch me some straw._

_You… trust me to go to town?_

_Oh, no. I expect I’ll never see you again._

She walked away clad in a heavy cloak and carrying a basket, and he thought that he might never see her again. In a way, that was alright. Some very small part of him insisted that if she was happy, it would be worth it to suffer the pain.

He didn’t even realize how much he cared for her until after she was already gone.

Hours later, up in his tower with only the soft clacking of the spinning wheel for company, he thought he was imagining someone coming up the path to the castle. Someone wrapped in a green and yellow cloak, carrying a basket full of straw.

He rushed down the steps, attempting to look like he’d been casually spinning on the wheel in the great hall, but likely failing entirely. She hadn’t just come back- oh no- she was smiling. She was _happy_ to be back, and her blue eyes sparkled as she came over to sit beside him on the wheel. Her hand brushed his knee, very softly. Did she even notice what she was doing?

Perhaps she did. Perhaps she did not.

Either way, her smile was mesmerizing, and having her so close to him was intoxicating. He almost didn’t notice what was happening when their lips met, very slowly, very hesitantly. It wasn’t like the first, the woman he’d married, who kissed him dutifully. It wasn’t like the second, who kissed him with fire and possession. It was… new. Strange.

And the part of him that was the Dark One screamed out in defiance.

He backed away, unusually disoriented, skin changing before his eyes. The green scaled melted away in patches to reveal soft, human skin, and he could feel the darkness inside him that belonged to the dagger burning away, slowly and painfully.

She broke his curse.

She _broke_ his _bloody_ curse.

It wasn’t possible. It couldn’t be possible. The only magic strong enough to break that kind of curse was True Love, and he had enough past experience to stop believing that True Love was something meant for monsters. She must have some sort of magic on her- it was a mistake to ever let her leave, to let outside forces have access to her. The plan all along must have been to get to him and take away his magic, weaken him as Regina had tried to do so many times.

He threw her out.

He put her in the dungeon until deciding that even having her around was far too dangerous, and then he let her go. She marched out like she marched in, with her head held high and her eyes ablaze and defiant. Worst of all, she claimed to actually love him.

Bah.

He wondered for a long time about her last words after that day. She couldn’t love him- she _couldn’t_ \- and yet her eyes were brimming with tears when she spoke. Knowing her, she was simply too stubborn to let them fall.

 _All you’ll have is an empty heart and a chipped cup_.

And then she was gone. Weeks later, the Queen came to the castle with news of the woman who left him in shambles, more so than either of the first. He should have learned to guard his heart by now, to lock it and throw away the key, but apparently the third was very good at lock picking.

According to the Queen, she was dead. They captured her and shunned her because of her association with the notorious Dark One, and set fire to the tower she was trapped in. She jumped from the window, and died.

Yet another loss. Yet another broken heart.

Mend the cracks, continue on. Pretend for the sake of your sanity that it never mattered, and if you can’t pretend (which he couldn’t, not with her) then don’t speak of it if you can help it. Guard it better next time.

Love and death. They both come in threes.

 

X

 

Rumpelstiltskin woke with a start, panting slightly. He lay on his back under thin summer sheets, looking around the darkened room, lit only by the moon and stars outside the window with its curtains drawn aside. The digital clock on the side table read 1:26AM.

Beside him, someone stirred, and it took a frightening moment to remember who it was. She pressed herself against his side, one arm draped across his chest, fingers tightening around the fabric of his thin shirt. She hummed sleepily and slowly propped herself up on one elbow, dark hair falling across her pale skin and ivory nightie. One of the thin straps slipped down off her shoulder, baring the first curve of her breast to the moonlight. Her blue eyes were wide with concern.

“Rum?” she mumbled, running her fingers through his hair gently. “Are you alright?”

“Yes,” he breathed, catching her hand and pressing it softly to his lips. “I’ll be fine.”

“Another nightmare?” she sounded both sympathetic and knowing, slowly nestling back against his side. It was beyond him why she would ever want to be near him in this way, much less openly show affection as she did. Rumpelstiltskin was feared- that was his role. She was one of the few who had ever actually loved him, and one of the only two still left alive.

“Of a sort,” he admitted. He dreamed of her death, and that was always a nightmare. Dreaming of lost loves and past sins he could deal with when he woke to the sight of her beside him, but dreaming her death… that was a different thing entirely.

He lost her so many times. The first time, she returned to him of her own accord. The second, someone else sent her to him. The third and final was the worst- she didn’t even remember who he was, went about her life without any knowledge of the love they once shared, the happiness they might have had. Now, to have her back in his arms, was more of a waking dream than anyone could ever ask for, more than he ever deserved.

She didn’t say anything for a long while, like she knew he would try to keep his nightmare from her and didn’t approve. Eventually, she relaxed against him and tilted her head up to kiss him gently.

“Rumpelstiltskin,” she whispered, “I love you, and I promise you… I’m not going anywhere. And if I ever do or anyone ever tries to make me… that’s what love is. You don’t stop fighting for it.”

He couldn’t help himself- he pulled her close, wrapping both his arms around her and kissing her until he was positive they both needed to breathe. She was so small, and yet so brave. Throwing herself out a tower window was completely unlike her, now that he thought about it. She would have found a way to escape and made it back to him.

The bravest, kindest person he knew fell back asleep beside him, wrapped in his arms with a sweet smile on her lips.

Ah, well. If things do come in threes, then… third time’s the charm?


End file.
